Baseball notes: Red Sox waste no time pulling plug on Bobby V

BOSTON — The Boston Red Sox thought Bobby Valentine would restore order to a coddled clubhouse that disintegrated during the 2011 pennant race.

The Associated Press

BOSTON — The Boston Red Sox thought Bobby Valentine would restore order to a coddled clubhouse that disintegrated during the 2011 pennant race.

Instead, he only caused more problems.

The brash and supremely confident manager was fired on Thursday, the day after the finale of a season beset with internal sniping and far too many losses. Valentine went 69-93 in his only year in Boston, the ballclub's worst season in almost 50 years.

"I understand this decision," Valentine said. "This year in Boston has been an incredible experience for me, but I am as disappointed in the results as are ownership and the great fans of Red Sox Nation. ... I'm sure next year will be a turnaround year."

A baseball savant who won the NL pennant with the New York Mets and won it all in Japan, Valentine was brought in after two-time World Series champion Terry Francona lost control of the clubhouse during an unprecedented September collapse. But the players who took advantage of Francona's hands-off approach bristled under Valentine's abrasive style.

More importantly, they didn't win for him, either.

Under Valentine, the Red Sox started 4-10 and didn't break .500 until after Memorial Day. By August, when the contenders were setting their playoff roster, the Red Sox knew they would not be among them and they traded some of their best players — and biggest salaries — to the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Without Adrian Gonzalez, Carl Crawford and Josh Beckett, the Red Sox will save $250 million in future salaries and have a chance to rebuild over the winter.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Former Boston Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling might have to sell or give up the famed blood-stained sock he wore on the team's way to the 2004 World Series championship to cover millions of dollars in loans he guaranteed to his failed video game company.

Schilling, whose Providence-based 38 Studios filed for bankruptcy in June, listed the sock as collateral to Bank Rhode Island in a September filing with the Massachusetts secretary of state's office. The sock is on display at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, N.Y.

Schilling also listed a baseball hat believed to have been worn by New York Yankees great Lou Gehrig and his collection of World War II memorabilia, including some the filing said is being held at the National World War II Museum.

Schilling told WEEI-AM in Boston on Thursday that possibly having to sell the sock is part of "having to pay for your mistakes." He said that "I put myself out there" in personally guaranteeing loans to 38 Studios and is seeking what he called an amicable solution with the bank.

"I'm obligated to try and make amends and, unfortunately, this is one of the byproducts of that," he told the station.

Hall of Fame spokesman Brad Horn declined to say whether Schilling has asked for the sock, on loan since 2005, to be returned.

MINNEAPOLIS — Some Minnesota lawmakers hope to force the release of Lou Gehrig's medical records, saying they might provide insight into whether the Yankees star died of the disease that came to take his name or whether repetitive head trauma played some kind of role.

Their effort comes despite opposition from Mayo Clinic, which holds the records, and skepticism from experts that the records alone would prove anything.

"But just in case they might it's ridiculous not to look at them," she said Thursday.

Gehrig's death is attributed to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, a debilitating neurological disease that after his death in 1941 became commonly known by his name.

Kahn said she became intrigued after reading about a widely publicized study in 2010 that suggested a potential link between repetitive brain trauma in athletes and ALS. She noted that Gehrig suffered several concussions during his career, in which he set a record for the most consecutive games played, and that he played football at Columbia University. Given all the information that's emerged in recent years about the long-term effects of head trauma in athletes, she said, it would be useful to know what Gehrig's records say.

Kahn said she and some other lawmakers hope to change state law to allow release of health records of patients who have been dead more than 50 years, unless descendants object or the patient signed a will or health care directive to the contrary.